From the age of nine, Juniper Smith began filling notebooks with his worlds, at first places of fantastical imagination, but later with each as an expression of some theme or idea that momentarily grabbed his interest. Over the course of eight years, he shared these worlds with his friends through twice-weekly sessions of tabletop gaming. Now at the age of seventeen, he finds himself in Aerb, a world that appears to be an amalgam of those many notebooks, stuck trying to find the answers to why he's there and what this world is trying to say. The most terrifying answer might be that this world is an expression of the person he was back on Earth.
This Used to Be About Dungeons is a cozy progression fantasy by rational-fiction author Alexander Wales (Worth the Candle). The series follows a found-family adventuring party as they delve systematically through tiered dungeons where each descent tests tactics, magic, and teamwork. What begins as dungeon-centric exploration expands into character-driven growth, worldbuilding, and escalating dungeon threats. Originally serialized on Royal Road, the series blends dungeon fantasy with emotional intelligence and slice-of-life progression, verified via Goodreads series 380539 and volume descriptions noting dungeon delving and party advancement.
Perry is a Thresholder, one of many who can step through portals into entirely new worlds across the vast multiverse. Each portal leads to a distinct reality — advanced technology with power armor and micro reactors, knights and wizards with magical swords, vampires on rainy streets, martial arts valleys with mystical sects, and mobile cities fleeing an encroaching sun. Able to carry ideas, technology, and magic between worlds, Thresholders have outsized impact, shaping civilizations. Perry travels with fellow Thresholder Maya Singh, mastering werewolf abilities, martial arts techniques from Moon Gate, and forbidden techniques while confronting rival Thresholders, sect politics, cosmic battles between godlike beings, and the crew of the SS Farfinder who have been tracking him across worlds to unite the multiverse.
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